Auto-Emancipation

Y

Zionist Publications

Auto-Emancipation

BY
LEO PINSKER

Translated;by D. S. Blondheim

Reprinted from the Maccabaean
By THE MACCABAEAN PUBLISHING COMPANY

NEW YORK

1906.

Snat Br

AUTO-EMANCIPATION:

An Admonition to

His Brethren by a

Russian Jew

<<If I do not help myself, who will help

4
{ THE misery caused by bloody deeds of vio-

lence has been followed by a moment of re-
pose, and baiter and baited can breathe
easier for a time. Meanwhile the Jewish
fugitives are being “repatriated” with the
very money that was collected to assist emt-
gration. The Jews in the Occident have
again learned to endure the cry of “Hep,
hep!” as their fathers did in days gone by.
The flaming outburst of indignation at the
disgrace endured has turned into a rain of
ashes which is gradually covering the glow-
ing soil. Close your eyes and hide your
heads in ostrich-fashion as you will, if you
do not take advantage of the fleeting mo-
ment of repose, and devise remedies more
radical than those palliatives with which
incompetents have for centuries vainly tried
to relieve our unhappy people, lasting peace
is impossible for you.

\, September, 1882.

“Yue eternal problem presented by the Jew-

ish Question stirs men to-day, as it did ages
ago. It remains unsolved, like the squaring
of the circle, unlike which, however, it is
still a burning question. This is due to the
fact that it is not merely a problem of theo-
retic interest, but one of practical interest,
which renews its youth from day to day,
as it were, and presses more and more im-
periously for a solution.

The essence of the problem, as we see
it, consists in the fact that, in the midst of
the nations among whom the Jews reside,
they form a heterogeneous element which

me? and if not now, when?’ —Hi1Er.

cannot be assimilated, which cannot be
readily digested by any nation. Hence the
problem is to find means of so adjusting
the relations of this exclusive element to
the whole body of the nations that there
shall never be any further basis for the
Jewish Question.

We cannot, of course, think of establish-
ing absolute harmony. Such harmony has
probably never existed, even. among the
other peoples. The millenium in| which the
“International” will disappear, and the na-
tions will merge into humanity, is still in-
visible in the distance. Until it is realized,
the desires and ideals of the nations must
be limited to establishing a tolerable modus
vivendi.

The world will have to wait long for uni=
versal peace; but meantime the relations of
the nations to one another may be adjusted
fairly well by an explicit mutual under-
standing, an understanding based upon in-
ternational law, treaties, and especially upon
a certain equality in rank and mutually
conceded rights, as well as upon mutual es-
teem. :

No such equality in rank appears in the
intercourse of the nations with the Jews.
In the latter case the basis is lacking for
that mutual e8teem which is generally reg-
ulated and secured by international law or
by treaties. Only when this basis is es-
tablished, when the equality of the Jews and
the other nations becomes a fact, can the
problem presented by the Jewish Question

i. “ 36414

2 AUTO-EMANCIPATION

be considered solved. Unfortunately, al-
though such equality existed in reality in
days long since forgotten, under present
conditions we can hope to see it restored
only in so remote a future that the admis-
sion of the Jewish people into the category
of the other nations seems illusory. They
lack most of those attributes which are the
hall-marks of a nation. They lack that
characteristic national life which is incon-
ceivable without a common language, com-
mon customs, and a common land. The
Jewish people have no fatheriand of their
own, though many motherlands; they have
no rallying point, no center of gravity, no
government of their own, no accredited
Tepresentatives. They are everywhere in
evidence, and nowhere at home. The na-
_ tions have never to deal with a Jewish na-
\ tion, but always with mere Jews. 'The Jews
are not a nation, because they lack a cer-
tain distinctive ; national character, pos-
sessed by every other nation, a character
which is determined by living together in
one country, under one government. , It
was clearly impossible for this national
character to be devcloped in the Dispersion;
the Jews seem rather to have lost every
memory of their former home. Thanks to
their ready adaptability, they have all the
more easily acquired the alien traits of the
people among whom their fate cast them.
Moreover, to please their- protectors, they
not seldom divested themselves of their tra-
ditional individuality. They acquired,- or
persuaded themselves that they had ac-
quired, certain cosmopolitan tendencies
which could appeal to others no more than
they could satisfy the Jews themselves.
“In seeking to fuse with other peoples,
they wilfuily renounced, to a éertain extent,
their own nationality. Nowhere, however,
did they succeed in obtaining from their
fellow-citizens recognition as native-born
citizens of equal rank.

The strongest fact, however, operating to

Prevent the Jews from striving after an in-
dependent national existence is the fact that
they feel no need for such an existence,
Not only do they feel no need for it, but
they even deny the reasonableness of such
a need. “i

In a sick person the absence of desire for
food and drink is a very serious symptom.
It is not always possible to cure him of this
fateful loss of appetite. And even if his
appetite is restored, it is still a question
whether he will be able to assimilate food,
even though he desires it.

The Jews are in the sad position of such
a patient. We must discuss this most im-
portant point with all possible precision.
‘We must prove “hat the misfortunes of the
Jews are due, above all, to their lack of de-
sire for national independence; and that
this desire must be evoked and maintained
in time if they do not wish to be exposed
forever to disgraceful existence—in a word,
we must prove that they must become a
nation.

In the apparently insignificant circum-
stance, that the Jews are not considered an
independent nation by the other peoples,
lies, in part, the secret of their anomalous
position and of their endless misery. The
mere fact of belonging to tis people con-
stitutes an indelible stigma, repellent to
non-Jews, and painful to the Jews them-
selves. Nevertheless, this phenomenon has
its basis deep down in the nature of man.

Among the living nations of the earth the
Jews occupy the position of a nation long
since dead. With the Icss of their father-
land, the Jewish people lost their indepen-
dence, and fell into a decay which is not
compatible with existence as an integral,
living organism. The state, crushed under
the weight of the Roman rule, disappeared
from before the eyes of the nations. But
after the Jewish people had given up their
existence as an actual state, as a political
entity, they could nevertheless not succumb

}
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;
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\

AU [O-EMANCIPATION 3

to total destruction—they did not cease to
exist spiritually as a nation. The world
saw in this people the uncanny form of one
of the dead walking among the living. ‘This
ghostlike apparition of a people without
unity or organization, without land or other
bend of union, no longer alive, and. yet
moving about among the living,—this
strange form, hardly paralleled in history,
unlike anything that preceded or followed
it, could not fail to make a strange, peculiar
impression upon the imagination of the
peoples. And, if the fear of ghosts is some-
thing iste. and has a certain justification
in the psychic life of humanity, what won-
der that it asserted itself powerfully at the
sight of this dead and yet living nation?

Fear of the Jewish ghost has been handed
down and strengthened for generations and
centuries. It led to a prejudice which, in
its turn, in connection with other circum-
stances to be discussed later, opened the
way for Judeophobia.

Along with a number of other uncon-
scious and superstitious ideas, instincts, and
idiosyncrasies, Judeophobia also has be-
come fully naturalized among all the peo-
ples of the earth with whom the Jews have
had intercourse. Judeophobia is a form of
demonopathy, with the distinction that the
Jewish ghost has become known to the
whole race of mankind, not merely to cer-
tain races, and that it is not incorporeal, like
other ghosts, but is a being of flesh and
blood, and suffers the most excruciating
pein from the wounds inflicted upon it by
the timorous multitude who imagine them-
selves threatened by it.

Judeophobia is a psychic disorder. As a
psychic disorder it is hereditary, and as a
coe transmitted for two thousand years
\it is incurable.

“Tt is the fear of ghosts which, as the
mother of Judeophobia, has evoked that ab-
stract, I might say Platonic hatred, thanks
to which the whole Jewish nation is wont

to be held responsible for the real or sup-
posed sins of its individual members, and
to be slandered in so many ways, to be es
feted about so shamefully.

Friend and foe alike have tried to explain|
or to justify this hatred of the Jews by
bringing all sorts of charges against them.
They are said to have crucified Jesus, to
have drunk Christian blood, to have poi-
soned wells, to have taken usury, to have
exploited the peasant, and so forth. These
and a thousand other charges against an
entire people were proved groundless. They
showed their own weakness by the very fact
that they had to be trumped up wholesale in
order to quiet the evil consciences of the
Jew-baiters, to justify the condemnation of
an entire nation, to prove the necessity of
burning the Jew, or rather the Jewish ghost,
at the stake. He who tries to prove too |
much proves nothing at all. Though the
Jews may justly be charged with many
shortcomings, those shortcomings are, at all
events, not such great vices, not such capi
tal crimes as to warrant the doom of the
entire people. In individual cases, indeed,
we find these accusations contradicted by
the fact that the Jews get along fairly well
in close intercourse with their non-Jewish
neighbors. This is the reason that the
charges preferred are usually of the most
general character, made up out of whole
cloth, based to a certain extent on a priori
reasoning, and true at most in individual
cases, but not admitting of proof as regards
the entire nation.

Thus have Judaism and Jew-hatred

ssed through history for centuries as in-
separable companions. Like the Jewish
people, the real wandering Jew, Jew-hatred,
too, seems as if it would never die. He
must be blind indeed who will maintain
that the Jews are not the chosen people, the
people chosen for universal hatred. No
matter how much the nations are at vari-
ance in their relations with one another, no

4 AUTO-EMANCIPATION

matter how different in their instincts and
endeavors, they join hands in their hatred
of the Jews; on this single point they are
all agreed. The extent and the manner in
which this antipathy is manifested depends,
of course, upon the cultural status of each
/people. The antipathy as such, however,
exists everywhere and at all times, no mat-
ter whether it appears in the form of deeds
of violence, as envious jealousy, or under
the mask of tolerance and protection. To
be plundered as a Jew or to be protected as
a Jew is equally humiliating, equally painful
to the self-respect of the Jews.

Having analyzed Judeophobia as an her-
editary form of demonopathy, peculiar to the
human race, and represented Jew-hatred as
based upon an inherited aberration of the
human mind, we must draw the important
conclusion, that we must give up contend-
ing against these hostile impulses, just as
we give up contending against every other
inherited predisposition. This view is all
the more important as showing that we
should at length recognize that polemics is
useless sparring, and abstain from it as a
waste of time and energy, for against su-
perstition even the gods fight in vain. Pre-
judice or instinctive ill-will can be satis-
fied by no reasoning, however forceful and
clear. These sinister powers must either
be kept within bounds by material coercion,
like every other blind force of nature, or
simply avoided.

In the psychology of the peoples, then,
we find the basis of the prejudice against
the Jewish nation; but other factors be-
sides, not less important, which render im-
possible the fusion or equalization of the
Jews with the other peoples, must also be
considered.

No people, generally speaking, has any
predilection for foreigners. This fact has
its ethnological basis, and cannot be brought
as a reproach against any people. Now, is
the Jew subject to this general law to the

same extent as the other nationalities? By
no means! The aversion which meets the
foreigner in a strange land can be repaid
in the same coin in his home country. The
non-Jew pursues his own interest in a for-
eign country openly and without giving of-
fense. It is everywhere considered natural
that he should fight for these interests,
alone or in league with others. The for
eigner has no need to be, or to seem to be,
a patriot. But as for the Jew, not only is
he not a native in his own home country,
but he is also not a foreigner; he is, in very
truth, the stranger par excellence. He is
regarded as neither friend nor foe, but as
a stranger, of whom the only thing known
is that he has no home. People do not
care to confide in the foreigner, or to trust
the Jew. The foreigner claims hospitality,
which he can repay in the same coin. The
Jew can make no such return ; consequently
he can make no claim to hospitality. He
is not a guest, much less a welcome guest.
He is more like a beggar; and what beggar
is welcome? He is rather a refugee; and
where is the refugee to whom a refuge
may not be denied? The Jews are aliens
who can have no representatives, because
they have no fatherland. Because they have
none, because their home has no boundaries
behind which they can entrench themselves,
their misery also has no bounds. The gen-
eral law does not apply to the Jews, as
strangers in the true sense of the word.
On the other hand, there ‘are everywhere
laws for the Jews, and if the general law
is to apply to them, this fact must first be
determined by a special law. Like the ne-
gtoes, like women, and unlike all free peo-
ples, they must be emancipated. It is all
the worse for them if, unlike the negroes,
they belong to an advanced race, and if,
unlike women, they can show not only wo-
men of distinction, but also men, even great
men,

Since the Jew is nowhere at home, no-

AUTO-EMANCIPATION Ss

where regarded as a native, he remains
everywhere an alien. That he himself and
his forefathers as well were born in the
country does not alter this fact in the least.
In the great majority of cases, he is treated
as a stepchild, as a Cinderella; in the most
favorable cases he is regarded as an adopt-
ed child, whose rights may be questioned;
never is he considered a legitiniate child of
the fatherland. The German, proud of his
Teutonic character, the Slav, the Celt, not
one of them admits that the Semitic Jew is
his equal by birth; and even if he is ready,
as a man of culture, to admit him to all
civil rights, he will never go so far as to
foreet the Jew in this fellow-citizen of his.
/The legal emancipation of the Jews is the
" crowning achievement of our century. But
Jegal emancipation is not social emancipa-
tion, and with the proclamation of the form-
er the Jews are still far from being eman-
cipated from their exceptional social posi-
Mion.
The emancipation of the Jews naturally

finds its justification in the fact that it will _

always be considered to have been a postu-
late of logic, of law, and of enlightened
self-interest. It can never be regarded as
a spontaneous expression of human feeling.
Far from owing its oricin to the sponta-
neous feeling of the peoples, it is never a
matter of course; and it has never yet taken
such deep root that further discussion of it
‘becomes unnecessary. In any event, wheth-
er emancipation was undertaken from spon-
‘taneous impulse or from conscious mo-
tives, it remains a rich gift, a splendid alms,
willingly or unwillingly flung to the poor,
thumble beggars whom no one, however,
cares to shelter, because a homeless, wan-
dering beggar wins confidence or sympathy
from none. The Jew is not permitted to
forget that the daily bread of civil rights
must be given him. The stigma attached
to this people, which forces an unenviable

isolation among the nations upon>it, can-
not be removed by any sort of official eman-
cipation, as long as this people produces in
accordance with its nature vagrant no-
mads, as long as it cannot give a satis-
factory account of whence it comes and
whither it goes, as long as the Jews them-
selves prefer not to speak in Aryan so-
ciety of their Semitic descent, and prefer
not to be reminded of it, as long as they are
persecuted, tolerated, protected, emanci-
pated.

This degrading dependencz of the eter-
nally alien Jew upon the non-Jew is re-
enforced by another factor, making a fusion
of the Jews with the original inhabitants
of a land absolutely impossible. In the
great struggle for existence, civilized peo-
ples readily submit ‘to laws which help to
change their struggle into a peaceful com-
petition, a noble emulation. Even in this
case the peoples usually make a distinction
between the native and the foreigner, the
first, of course, always being given the
preference. Now, if this distinction is drawn
even against the foreigner of equal birth,
how harshly is it insisted upon, in refer-
ence to the eternally alien Jew! With what
irritation the beggar must be regarded who
dares to cast longing glances upon a land,
the home of others, as upon a beloved wo-
man guarded by distrustful relatives! And
if he nevertheless prospers, and succeeds in
plucking a flower here and there from its
soil, woe to the ill-fated man! Let him not
complain if he experiences what the Jews
in Spain and Russia have experienced.

The Jews, moreover, do not suffer only
when they achieve distinguished success.
Wherever they are congregated in large
masses, they must, by their very numbers,
have a certain advantage in competiticn
with the. non-Jewish population. In the
western provinces of Russia we behold the
Jews herded together, eking out a wretched

6 AUTO-EMANCIPATION

existence in the most dreadful destitution,

Nevertheless, complaints of the exploitation

practiced by the Jews never cease.

/ To sum up what has been said, for the liy-
ing, the Jew is a dead man, for the natives an
alien and a vagrant, for property-holders
a beggar, for the poor an exploiter and a
millionaire, for patriots a man without a
country, for all classes a hated rival.

This natural antagonism is the basis of
the untold number of reciprocal misunder-
standings and accusations and reproaches
which both parties rightfully or wrongfully

(cast at each other. Thus the Jews, instead
of realizing their own position and adopt-
ing a rational line of conduct, appeal to
eternal justice, and fondly imagine that the
appeal will have some effect. On the other
hand, the non-Jews, instead of relying sim-
ply upon their superior force and holding
fast to their historical and actual stand-
point—the standpoint of the stronger—try
to justify their unfavorable attitude by a
mass of accusations which, on closer exam-
ination, prove to be baseless or negligible.
He, however, who desires to be unbiased,
who does not desire to judge and interpret
the affairs of this world according to the
Principles of an Utopian Arcadia, but would
merely ascertain and explain them in order
to reach a conclusion of practical value,
will not make either of the parties seriously
responsible for the antagonism described.
To the Jews, however, in whom we are
chiefly interested, he will say: “You cer-
tainly are a foolish and contemptible people !
You are foolish, because you stand awk-
wardly by and expect of human nature
something which it has always lacked—
humanity. You are contemptible, because
you have no real self-love and no national
self-respect.”

National self-respect! Where can we
cet it? It is truly the greatest misfortune
of our race that we do not constitute a na-
tion; that we are merely Jews. We are a

flock scattered over the whole face of the
earth, without a shepherd to protect us and
gather us together. Under the most favor-
able circumstances we reach the rank of
goats, which are mated in Russia with race-
horses. And that is the highest goal of our
ambition !

It is true that our dear protectors have al-

ways taken good care that we should never:

get out of breath and recover our self-re-
spect. As individual Jews, but not as a
Jewish nation, we have carried on for cen-
turies the hard and unequal struggle for ex-
istence. In isolation each separate individ-
ual had to waste his genius and his energy
for a little oxygen and a morsel of bread,.
moistened with tears. In this hopeless
struggle we did not succumb. We waged:
the most glorious of all partisan struggles.
with all the peoples of the earth, who with
one accord, desired to exterminate us. But
the war we have waged—and God knows
how long we shall continue to wage it—
has not been for a fatherland, but for the
wretched maintenance of millions of “Jew
peddlers.”

If all the peoples of the earth were not
able to blot out our existence, they were
nevertheless able to destroy in us the feel-
ing of our national independence. And as
for ourselves we look on with fatalistic
indifference when in many a land we are
refused a recognition which would not
lightly be denied to Zulus. In the Dis-
persion we maintained our individual life,
and proved our power of resistance, but we
lost the common bond of our national con-
sciousness. Seeking to maintain our ma-\
terial existence, we were constrained only
too often to forget our moral dignity. We:
did not see that on account of tactics un-
worthy of us, which we were forced to:
adopt, we sank still lower in the eyes of
our opponents, that we were only the more-
exposed to humiliating contempt and out-
lawry, which have finally become our bale-

_

\

AUTO-EMANCIPATION I

e heritage. In the wide, wide world there

/was no place for us. We prayed only for

a little place anywhere to lay our weary
head to rest; and so, by lessening our
claims, we gradually lessened as well our
dignity, which was effaced in our own and
others’ eyes until it became unrecognizable.
‘We were the shuttle-cock which the peoples
tossed in turn to one another. The cruel
game was equally amusing whether we were
caucht or thrown, and was enjoyed all the
more, the more elastic and yielding our na-
tional respect became in the hands of the
peoples. Under such circumstances, how
could there be any question of national self-
determination, of a free, active development
of our national force or of our native ge-
nius?

We may note, in passing, that our ene-
mies, in order to prove our inferiority, have
not failed to make capital of this last trait,
which, though in a measure borne out by
facts, is at bottom altogether irrelevant.
One would think that men of genius were as
plentiful among our opponents as black-
berries in August. Poor creatures! They
reproach the eagle who once soared to
heaven and recognized the Divinity, be-

Fg he cannot rise high in air when his
wings are clipped! But even with wings
clipped we have remained on a level with
the great peoples of civilization. Grant us
but the happiness of independence, allow us
-to be sole masters of our fate, give us a bit
of land, grant us only what you granted the
Servians and Roumanians, the advantage of
a free national existence, and then dare to
pass a slighting judgment upon us, to re-
proach us with a lack of men of genius!
At present we still live under the oppression
of the evils you have’ inflicted upon us.
What we lack is not genius, but self-re-
spect, and the consciousness of human dig-
nity of which you have robbed us.

If we are ill-treated, robbed, plundered,
outraged, we do not dare defend ourselves,

Fy.

and, worse still, we look upon it almost as a
matter of course. If a blow is dealt us in
the face, we soothe our burning cheek with
cold water; and if a bloody wound has been
inflicted upon us, we put on a bandage. If
we are cast out of the house which we have
built for ourselves, we beg humbly for
mercy, and if we do not succeed in touch-
ing the heart of our oppiessor we move on
and seek—another exile. If we hear. an
idle spectator on the road call out to us:
“You poor devils of Jews certainly are to
be pitied,” we are most deeply touched; and
if a Jew is said to be an honor to his peo-
ple, that people is foolish enough to be proud
of it. We have sunk so low that we be-
come almost jubilant when, as in the Occi-
dent, a small fraction of our people is put
on an equal footing with non-Jews. But
he who must be put on a footing, assuredly
stands insecurely. If no notice is taken of
our descent and we are trea‘ed like others
born in the country, we cre thankful to the
point of actually turning renegades. For
the sake of the comfortable position we are

granted, for the flesh-pots which we may °

enjoy in peace, we persuade ourselves, and
others, that we are. not Jews any longer,
bet full-blooded sons cf the fatherland.
Idle delusion! You may prove yourselves
patriots ever so true, you will still be re-
minded at every opportunity of your Semit-
ic descent. This fateful memento mort
will not prevent you, however, from enjoy-
ing the hospitality extended, until some fine
morning you are cast out of the country,
until the sceptical mob reminds you that you
are, after all, nothing but nomads and para-
sites, protected by no law.

But even umane treatment should not
be a proof to us that we are desired rather
than cursed.

What a pitiful figure we do cut! We do
not count as a nation among the other na-
tions, and we have no voice in the council
of the peoples, even in affairs which con-

/

8 AUTO-EMANCIPATION

.

“cern us. Our fatherland is the other man’s
country ; our unity—dispersion, our solidari-
ty—the general hostility to us, our weapon
—humility, our defense—flight, our indi-
viduality—adaptability, our future—to-mor-
tow. What a contemptible role for a peo-
ple which once had its Maccabees !

~ What wonder that a people who have
allowed themselves to be trampled upon for
‘dear life’s sake, and have learned to love
the very feet that trample upon them, should
fall a prey to the utmost contempt !

The tragic feature of our history is that
we can neither die nor live. We are not
able to die despite the blows of our enemies,
and we do not wish to die by our own hand,
through apostasy or self-destruction. Neith-
‘er can we live; our enemies look well to
that. Nor do we desire to begin a new life
as a nation, to live like the other peoples,
thanks to those over-zealous patriots who
think it is necessary to sacrifice every claim
upon independent national life to their loy-

alty as citizens—which is, moreover, quite

a matter of course. Such patriotic fana-

“tics deny their ancient national character

for the sake of any other nationality, what-
ever it may be, of high rank or of low rank.
But they deceive no one. They do not see
how gladly people would dispense with their
Jewish companionship.

~ Thus for eighteen centuries we have
lived in disgrace, without a single earnest
attempt to cast it off! We know well the
great history of the sufferings of our peo-
ple, and we would be the last to make our
forefathers responsible for it. Care for in-
‘dividual self-preservation necessarily nipped
in the bud every national thought, every
‘united movement. If the non-Jewish peo-
ples, thanks to our dispersion, desire to
strike in each of us the whole Jewish peo-
‘ple, we were indeed Tesistent enough not to
succumb as a people, but we were only too
powerless to rise and carry on an active
‘struggle in our own behalf. Under the op-

pression of all the hostile peoples of the
world, we have lost in the course of our
long exile all self-confidence, all initiative.

Moreover, the belief in a Messiah, the
belief in the intervention of a higher power
to bring about our political resurrection, and
the religious assumption that we must -bear
patiently a punishment inflicted upon us by
God, caused us to abandon every care for
our national liberty, for our unity and in-
dependence. Consequently, we really gave
up every thought of a fatherland, and did
so the more willingly, the more we had to
care for our material welfare. Thus we
sank lower and lower. The people without
a fatherland forgot their fatherland. Is it
not high time to realize what a disgrace
this state of things is to us?

Happily, affairs are now in a somewhat
different position. The events of the last
few years in enlightened Germany, in Rou-
mania, in Hungary, and especially in Rus-
sia, have'effected what the far bloodier per-
secutions of the Middle Ages could not
effect. The national consciousness which
until then had existed only in the latent
state of a sterile martyrdom, burst forth
under our eyes among the masses of the
Russian and Roumanian Jews in the shape
of an irresistible movement toward Pales-
tine. Mistaken as this movement has been
proved by its results, it testifies, neverthe-
less, to the correct instinct of the people, to
whom it became clear that they needed a
home. The severe tests which they have
endured have now produced a reaction
which points to something other than fatal-
istic submission to a punishment inflicted
by the hand of God. Even the unenlight-
ened masses of the Russian Jews have not
entirely escaped the influences of the prin-
ciples of modern culture. Without re-
nouncing Judaism and their faith, they re-
volted most deeply at undeserved *ill-treat-
ment, which could be inflicted with impuni-
ty only because the Russian Government

AUTO-EMANCIPATION 9

regards the Jews as aliens. And the other
European governments—why should they
concern themselves with the citizens of a
state in whose internal affairs they have no
right to interfere?

Nowadays, when our brethren in a small
part of the earth have caught their breath
and can feel more deeply for the sufferings
of their brothers; nowadays, when a num-
ber of other dependent and oppressed na-
tionalities have been allowed to regain their
independence, we, too. must not sit a mo-
ment longer with folded hands; we must
not admit that we are doomed to play on in
the future the hopeless role of the “Wan-
dering Jew.” This role is truly hopeless;
it is enough to drive one to despair.

If an individual is unfortunate enough
to see himself despised and rejected by so-
ciety, no one wonders if he commits sui-
cide. But where is the deadly weapon to
give the coup de grace to all the Jews scat-
tered over the face of the earth, and what
hand would offer itself for the work? This
destruction is neither possible nor desira-
ble. Consequently, it is our bounden duty
to devote all our remaining moral force to
re-establishing ourselves as a living nation,
so that we may finally assume a more fitting
and dignified role.

If the basis of our reasoning is sound,
if the prejudice of the human race against
us rests upon anthropological and social
principles, innate and ineradicable, we must
look no more to the slow progress of hu-
manity, and we must learn to recognize that
as long as we lack a home of our own,
such as the other nations have, we must re-
sign forever the noble hope of becoming
the equals of our fellow-men. We must
recognize that before the great idea of
human brotherhood will unite all the peo-
ples of the earth, milleniums must elapse;
and that meanwhile a people which is at
home everywhere and nowhere, must every-
where be regarded as alien. The time has

come for a sober and passionless realization
of our true position. With unbiased eyes
and without prejudice we must recogniz>
in the mirror of the nations the tragi-comic
figure of our people, which, with distorted
countenance and maimed limbs, helps to
make universal history, without having de-
cently finished its own little history. We
must reconcile ourselves, once for all, to:
the idea that the other nations, by reason
of their eternal, natural antagonism, will
forever reject us. We may not shut our
eyes to this natural force, which works like
every other elemental force; we must take:
it into account. We may not complain of
it; on the contrary, we are in duty bound to
take courage, to rise, and to see to it that
we do not remain forever the Cinderella,
the butt of the peoples.

/

We are no more justified in leaving our
national fortune entirely in the hands of
the other peoples than we are in making
them responsible for our national misfor-
tune. The human race, and we as well,
have scarcely traversed the first stage of
the immeasurably long road leading to the
practice of perfect humanitarianism—if
that goal is ever to be reached. Therefore
we must abandon the delusive idea that we
are fulfilling by our dispersion a Pro-
vidential mission, a mission in which no one
believes, an honorable station which we, to
speak frankly, would gladly resign, if the
odious epithet “Jew” could only be blotted
out of the memory of man.

We must seek our honor and our salva-
tion not in illusory self-deceptions, but in
the restoration of a national bond of union.
Flitherto the world has not considered us
as a firm of standing, and consequently we
enjoyed no decent credit.

Tf the nationalistic endeavors of the vari-
ous peoples who have risen before our eyes .
bore their own justification, can it still be
questioned whether similar aspirations on
the part of the Jews would not be justified ?
They play a more important part than those
peoples in the life of the civilized nations,

10 “at

and they have deserved more from. human-
ity; they have a past, a history, a common,
unmixed descent, an indestructible vigor,
an unshakable faith, and an unexampled
history of suffering to show; the peoples
have sinned against them more grievously
than against any other nation. Is not that
enough to make them capable and worthy
of possessing a fatherland?

The struggle of the Jews for unity and
independence as an organized nation not
only possesses the inherent justification that
belongs to the struggle of every oppressed
people, but it is also calculated to attract
the sympathy of the people to whom we are
rightly or wrongly obnoxious. This strug-

gle must be entered upon in such a spirit ,

as to exert an irresistible pressure upon the
international politics of the present, and
the future will assuredly bear witnéss to its
results.

At the very outset we must be prepared
for a great outery. The first stirrings of
this struggle will doubtless be given out
by most of the J ews, who have with rea-
son become timorous and sceptical, as the
unconscious conyulsions of an organism
dangerously ill; and certainly the attain-
ment and realization of the object of such
endeavors will be fraught with the greatest
difficulties, will perhaps be possible only
after superhuman efforts. But consider
that the Jews have no other way out of
their desperate position; and that it would
be cowardly not to take that way merely be-
cause it is long, difficult and dangerous, or
because it offers only a few chances of a
happy result. But “faint heart never won
fair lady”—and, indeed, what have we to
lose? At the worst, we shall continue to be
in the future what we have been in the past,
what we are too cowardly to resolve that we

“will be no longer: eternally despised. Jews.
We have lately had very bitter experi-
ences in Russia. That country has too
many and too few of us: too many in the
southwestern provinces, in which the J ews
are allowed to reside, and too few in all the
others, in which they are forbidden to re-
side. If the Russian government, and the

AUTO-EMANCIPATION

Russian people as well, realized that an
equal distribution of the Jewish population
would inure only to the benefit of the en-
tire country, the persecutions which we
have suffered would probably not have taken
place. But, alas, Russia cannot and will
not realize this. That is not our fault,
neither is it a consequence of the low cul-
tural status of the Russian people; we have
found our bitterest opponents, indeed, in a
large part of the press, which ought to ke
intelligent; the unfortunate situation of
the Russian Jews is due, rather, purely and
simply to the operation of those general
forces, the consequences of the nature of
humanity, which we have previously dis-
cussed. Accordingly, as it is not to be our
task to improve the human race, we must
see what we, ourselves, have to do under
the circumstances.

Since conditions are and must remain
such as-we have described them, we shall
forever continue to be what we have been
and are, parasites, who are a burden to
the rest of the population, and can never
secure their favor. The fact that, as it
Seems, we can mix with the nations only
in the smallest proportions, presents a fur-
ther obstacle to the establishment of ami-
cable relations. Therefore, we must see to
it that the surplus, the unassimilable resi-
due, is removed and elsewhere provided
for. This duty can be incumbent upon no
one but ourselves. If the Jews could be
equally distributed among all the peoples
of the earth, perhaps there would be no
Jewish question. But this is not possible.
Nay, more, there can be no doubt that an
immigration of the J ews en masse into the
most advanced states would be declined
with emphasis.

We say this with a heavy heart; but we
must admit the truth. And this admission
is the more important, inasmuch as it
would only be realizing the truth that we
can improve our position.

Moreover, it would be very unfortunate
if we were not willing to profit by those re-
sults of our experience which have practi-
eal value. The most important of these ;
results is the constantly growing convic-

- AUTO-EMANCIPATION $f

tion that we are nowhere at home, and that
we finally must have a home, if not a
country of our own.

Another result of our experience is the
recognition that the lamentable outcome of
the emigration from Russia and Roumania
is ascribable solely to the momentous fact
that we were taken by it unawares; we had
made no provision for the principal needs,
a refuge and a systematic organization of
the emigration. When thousands were
seeking new homes we forgot to provide
for that which no villager forgets when he
desires to move—the small matter, forsooth,
of a new and suitable dwelling.

/, If we would have a secure home, so that
we may give up our endless life of wan-
dering and rehabilitate our nation in our
own eyes, and in the eyes of the world, we
must, above all, not dream of restoring an-
cient Judea. We must not attach ourselves
“to the place where our political life was
once violently interrupted and destroyed.
The goal of our present endeavors must be
not the “Holy Land,” but a land of our
own. We need nothing but a large piece
of land for our poor brothers; a piece of
Jand which shall remain our property, from
which no foreign master can expel us.
Thither we shall take with us the most
sacred possessions which we have saved
from the shipwreck of our former father-
land, the God-idea and the Bible. It is
only these which have made our old father-
land the Holy Land, and not Jerusalem or
the Jordan. Perhaps the Holy Land will
again become ours. If so, all the better, but
first of all, we must determine—and this is
the crucial point—what country is accessi-
ble to us, and at the same time adapted to
offer the Jews of all lands who must leave
their homes a secure and unquestioned
‘refuge, capable of being made productive.

We do not fail to recognize that the at-
tainment of this goal, which is to be the
life-long object of our people, will involve
the greatest difficulties, both from within
and from without. More difficult than any-
thing else will be the satisfaction’ of the
first and most essential condition, the na-
tional ‘resolution; for we are, to our sor-

row, a stiff-necked people. How readily
could conservative opposition, of which our
history has so much to tell, nip such a res-
olution in the bud! If it should, then woe
to our entire future!

What a difference between Past and Pres-
ent! In unity and in serried ranks we oncé

= z
accomplished an orderly departure from
Egypt, to escape from a shameful slavery,
and conquer a fatherland.. Now we wan-
der as fugitives and exiles with the foot
of the ruffianly boor upon our necks, death
in our hearts, without a Moses for our lead-
er, without 1a promise of land which we are
to conquer by our own might. We are /
driven through the lands of all rulers: here
we are escorted further with all politeness,
in order that we may not introduce a
plague; there fortune grants that we are
provided for anywhere and anyhow, in
order that we may be free and unmolested—
deal in old clothes, make cigarettes,
or became incompetent farmers. It would
be a euphemism to speak of this movement
as an emigration. Ashamed and perplexed \
the fugitives stood on the border and looked
out with their hollow eyes for help. A few
barracks and a few thousand passports
served, as it were, as an answer! Then a
few more repatriations, another thousand
bitter disillusionments, and the flood of a
popular movement newly awakened to life
ebbs. All becomes quiet round about, and
our beneficent brothers in the West betake
themselves comfortably to repose. The surg-
ing sea of yesterday is calmed, and changes
into the old swamp with the old creeping
things.

Thus, for centuries we have been turn-
ing around - perplexedly in the enchanted
circle, allowing blind fate to work its
will upon us. The sorrows of thousands of
years have made us only a folk of “Merci-
ful Brethren,” but have not trained up any
rational healers of our ills. We continue
on in the old, humdrum way seeking only
for the palliative of beneficence. But we
would hear nothing of taking our malady
at the root, in order to effect. a complete
cure.

Intelligent and rich in experience, we

UNIVERSITY OF
SLLINOIS LIBRARY
AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN

I2

are as short-sighted and thoughtless as
children; we have had no time to reflect and
ask ourselves whether this mad race, or
rather this mad rout, will ever come to an
end.

In the life of peoples, as in the life of in-

| dividuals, there are important moments

| which do not often recur, and which, ac-
| cording as they are utilized or not utilized,

exercise a decisive influence upon the fu-
ture of the people as of the individual,
whether for weal or for woe. We are now
passing through such 'a moment.
sciousness of the people is awake. The
great ideas of the eighteenth and nineteenth
centuries have not passed by our people
without leaving a trace. We feel not only
as Jews; we feel as men. As men, we, too,
would fain live and be a nation like the
others. And if we seriously desire that, we
must first of all extricate ourselves from the
old yoke, and rise manfully to our full
height. We must first of all desire to help
ourselves. ..Only then will the help of oth-
ers as well be sure to come.

But the time in which we live is adapted
for decisive action, not merely because of
our own inner experience, not merely in
consequence of our newly-aroused self-con:
sciousness. The general history of the pres-
ent day seems called to be our ally. Ina
few decades we have seen rising into new
life nations which at an earlier time would
not have dared to dream of a resurrection.
The dawn already appears amid the dark-
ness of traditional statesmanship. The
governments are already inclining their
ears—first, to be sure, in those cases in
which they cannot do otherwise—to the
louder and louder tones of national self-
consciousness. It is true that those happy
ones who attained their national indepen-
dence were not Jews. They lived upon
their own soil and spoke one language, and
therein they certainly had the advantage of
us.

But what if our position is more difficult 2
That is all the more reason why we should
strain every energy to the task of ending
our national misery in honorable fashion.
We must go to work resolved and ready

The con- ,

AUTO-EMANCIPATION

for sacrifice, and God will help us. We
were always ready for sacrifice, and we did
not lack resolution to hold our banner
fast, even if not to hold it high. But
we sailed the surging ocean of universal
history without a compass, and such a com-
pass must be invented. Far off, very far
off, is the heaven for which our soul longs.
As yet we do not even know where it is,
whether in the East or in the West. For
the wanderer of a thousand years, however,
no way, no matter how distant, may be too
long. 2
But how can we find that haven without
sending out an expedition? If we are once
so happy as to know what we need, and if
only we are resolved, we must go forward
with all care and foresight, step by step,
without undue haste, and we must strug-
gle with all our strength against being di-
verted into by-paths. We probably lack a’
leader of the genius of Moses—history does
not grant a people such guides repeatedly.
But a clear recognition of what we need
most, a recognition of the absolute necessi-
ty of a home of our own, would arouse
among us a number of energetic, honorable,
and distinguished friends of the people, who
would undertake the leadership, and would,
perhaps, be no less able than that one man
to deliver us from disgrace and persecution.
What should we do first of all, how should”
we make a beginning? We believe that anu-
cleus for this beginning is already at hand;
it consists in the societies already in ex*
istence. It is incumbent upon them, they are
called and in duty bound, to lay the foun-
dation of that lighthouse to which our eyes
will turn. If they are to be equal te their
new task, these societies must, of course,
be completely transformed. They must con-
voke a national congress, of which they are
to form the centre. If they decline thig/
function, however, and if they think that
they may not overstep the boundaries of
their previous activity, they must at least
form some of their number into a national
institute, let us say a directory, whic’ =U
have to supply the place of that unity
we lack, without which the success Ox
endeavors is unthinkable. As a represen-

AUTO-EMANCIPATION 13

tative of our national interest, this insti-
tute must pe made up of the heads of our
people, and it must energetically take in
hand the direction of our general, national
affairs. Our greatest and best forces—men
of finance, of science, and of affairs, states-
men and publicists—must join hands with
one accord. in steering toward the common
destination. This would succeed chiefly and
especially in creating a secure and invxiol-
able home for the surplus of those Jews who
live as proletarians in the different coun-
tries and are a burden to the native citi-
zens. ;

There can, of course, be no question
whatever of a united emigration of the en-
tire people. The comparatively small num-
‘ber of Jews in the Occident, who con-
stitute an insignificant percentage of the
population, and for this reason, perhaps,
are better situated and even to a certain ex-
tent naturalized, may in the future remain
where they are. The wealthy may also re-
main even where the Jews are not readily
tolerated. But, as we have said before, there
is a certain point of saturation, beyond
which their numbers may not increase, if
the Jews are not to be exposed to the dan-
gers of persecution, as in Russia, Roumania,
Moroceo, and elsewhere. It is this sur-
plus which, a burden to itself and to others,
conjures up the evil fate of the entire peo-
ple. It is now high time to create a refuge
for this overplus. We must occupy our-
selves with the foundation of such a lasting
refuge, not with the purposeless collection
of donations for pilgrims or fugitives who
forsake, in their consternation, a hospitable
home, to perish in the abyss of a strange
.and unknown land.

’ The first task of this national institute,
which we miss so much and must uncon-
ditionally call into existence, would have
to be the discovery of a territory adapted to
our purpose, as far as possible continuous
in extent and of uniform character. In
this respect there would probably com-
mend themselves. most highly those two
lands, situated in opposite parts of the
world, which have lately vied with each
other for first place in creating two oppo-

’

site currents in the Jewish emigration.
Lhis division was the cause of the failure
of the entire movement.

Without plan, destination, or unity, as the

emigration was, it would really have to be

regarded as entirely unsuccessful and as
having disappeared without a trace, had
it not been so instructive as to what we
should do and what we should leave un-
done in the future. With the total lack-of
foresight, reasonable consideration, and wise
unity, it was impossible to recognize in
the chaos of wandering, famishing fugi-
tives a movement with any prospects what-
ever, directed toward a clearly marked goal.
It was no emigration, but a portentous
flight. For the poor fugitives the years 1881
and 1882 were a highway covered with
wounded and corpses. And even the few
who were so happy as to reach the goal of
their desires, the longed-for haven, found
the latter no whit better than the dangerous
road. Wherever they came, people tried
to get rid of them. The emigrants were
soon confronted by the desperate alternative
of either roaming about without \shelter,
without help, and without a plan in a
strange land, or wandering back shame-
facedly to their no less strange and loveless
home-country. This emigration was for our
people nothing but a new date in its mar-
tyrology. But this aimless wandering in
the labyrinth of exile, to which our people
has always been accustomed, does not cause
them to advance a step; they rather sink
deeper in the sticky morass of their wan-
derings. In the last emigration no sign of
progress toward a better state of things is
to be observed. Persecution, flight, disper-
sion, and a new exile—just as in the good
old times. The weariness of the persecu-
tors now allows us a little respite; will we
be satisfied with it? Or will we rather use
this respite to draw the proper moral from

the experience accumulated, in order that

we may escape the new blows which are
sure to come? S

It is to be hoped that we have now passed
that stage in which the Jews of the Middle
Ages wretchedly vegetated. The sons of

Ep
:

14 AUTO-EMANCIPATION

modern culture among our people esteem
their dignity no less highly than our op-
pressors do theirs. But we shall not be
able successfully to defend this dignity
until we stand upon our own feet. As
soon as un asylum is found for our poor
people, for the fugitives whom our historic
and predestined fate will always create for
us, we shall simultaneously rise in the
opinion of the peoples. We shall forthwith
cease. to be surprised by such tragic hap-
penings as in the last few years, happenings
which promise, alas, to be repeated more
than once, not only in Russia, but also in
other countries. We must labor actively
to complete the great work of self-libera-
tion. We must use all means which human
intellect and human experience have de-
vised, in order that the sacred work of na-
tional regeneration may not be left to blind
chance,

The land which we are about to pur-
chase must be productive and have a good
situation, and an area sufficient to allow the
settlement of several millions. The land,
as) national property, must be inalienable.
Its selection is, of course, of the first and
highest importance, and must not be left
to off-hand decision or to certain precon-
ceived sympathies or individuals, as has,
alas, happened lately. This land must be
uniform and continuous in extent, for it
lies in the very nature of our problem that
We must possess as a counterpoise to our
dispersion one single refuge, since a num-
ber of refuges would again present the fea-
tures of our old dispersion. Therefore, the
selection of a national and permanent land,
meeting «all requirements, must be made
with all care, and confided to one single
national institute, to a commission of ex-
perts selected from our directory. Only such
a supreme tribunal will be able, after thor-
ough and comprehensive investigation, to
give an opinion and decide upon which of
the two continents and upon which terri-
tory in them our final choice should fall.

Only then, and not before, should the di-
rectory, together with an associated body of
capitalists, as founders of a stock company
later to be organized, purchase 1a piece of

land upon which in the course of time sey-
eral million Jews could settle. This piece
of land might form a small territory in
North America, or a sovereign pashalie in
Asiatic Turkey, recognized by the Porte
and the other Powers as neutral. It would
certainly be an important duty of the direc-
tory to secure the assent of the Porte, and

‘probably of the other European cabinets to

this plan.

The land purchased would have to be di-
vided by surveyors, under the supervision
of the directory, into small parcels, which
could be assigned according to the local con-
ditions to agricultural, or building, or man-
ufacturing purposes. Every parcel laid off
thus (for agriculture, house and garden,
town-hall, factory, ete.) would form a lot
which would be transferred to the pur-
chaser in accordance with his wishes.

After a complete survey and the publi-
cation of detailed maps and a comprehen-
sive description of the land, a part of the
lots would be sold to Jews for ian adequate
payment at a price in exactly determined
prevortion to the cost-price, perhaps some-
what higher than the latter. The proceeds
of the sale, together with the profits, would
belong in part to the stock company and
be turned in part into a fund to be admin-
istered by the directory, for the mainte-
nance of destitute immigrants. For the es-
tablishment of this fund the directory
could ‘also open a national subscription. It
is definitely to be expected that our
brethren everywhere would hail with joy
such an appeal for subscriptions, that the
most liberal donations would be made for
such a sacred purpose.

In the title-deed given every purchaser,
made out in his name, and signed by the di-
rectory and the company, the exact number
of the lot upon the general map would be
given, so that every one could see clearly
the location of the piece of ground—field,
or building lot—which he purchases as his
individual property.

Assuredly, many a Jew, perhaps momen-
tarily fettered to his old home by an occu-
pation little to be envied, would joyfully

grasp. the opportunity to throw out an

ak

AUTO-EMANCIPATION Gane te ee I

anchor to windward by such a deed, and to
escape those sad experiences in which the
immediate past is so rich.

That part of the territory which would
be assigned to the directory for free distri-
bution, in return for the national subscrip-
tion mentioned, and for the financial re-
turns to be expected, would be given to
destitute but able-bodied immigrants, re-
commended for consideration by local com-
mittees.

As the donations to the national sub-
seript'on would have to come in, not all at
once, but say in annual instalments, the
settlement, too, would have to be made
gradually and in a fixed order.

If the experts give their opinion in favor
of Palestine or Syria, this decision would
have to be based on the hypothesis that the
country could be transformed in time by
labor and industry into a quite productive
one. In this case land there would rise in
price in the future.

If the decision of those selected should
be in favor of North America, however, we
must hasten. If one considers that in the
last thirty-eight years the population of the
United States of America has risen from
seventeen millions to fifty millions, ‘and that
the increase in population for the next
forty years will probably continue in the
same proportion, we can well understand
that zmmediaté action is necessary, if we
do not desire to eliminate for all time the
possibility of establishing in the New World
a secure refuge for our unhappy brethren.

Every one who has the slighest judg-
ment can see at first glance that the pur-
chase of lands in America would, because
of the swift rise of that country, not be a
risky undertaking, but a lucrative enter-
prise. ;

Whether this act of national self-help on
our part would be a more or less productive
enterprise, however, is of little importance
in comparison with the great significance
which such ian undertaking would have for

/the future of our unsettled people; for our
' future will remain insecure and pre-

carious so long as a radical change in
our position is not made. This change

(ara tees

cannot be brought about by the civil eman-
cipation of the Jews in this or that state,
but only by the auto-emancipation of the

Jewish people as a nation, the foundation .

of a colonial community belonging to the
Jews, which is some day to become our in-
alienable home, our fatherland. :

There will certainly be no lack of objec-
tion to our plans. We will still be charged
with reckoning without our host. What
land will grant us permission to constitute
a nation within its borders? At first
glance, our building would appear from
this standpoint to be a house of cards to
divert children and wits. We think, how-
ever, that only thoughtless childhood eould
be diverted by the sight of shipwrecked
voyagers who desire to build a little boat in
order to leave an inhospitable country. We
even go so far as to say that we expect,
strangely enough, that those inhospitable
peoples will aid us in our departure. Our
“trends” will see us leave with the same
pleasure with which we turn our back upon
them.

Of course, the establishment of a Jewish
refuge cannot come about without the sup-
port of the governments. In order to «at-
tain the latter and to insure the perpetual
existence of a refuge, the creators of our
national regeneration will have to proceed
with patience and care. What we seek is
at bottom neither new nor dangerous for
anyone. Instead of the many refuges
which we have always been accustomed to
seek, we would fain have one single refuge,
the existence of which, however, would
have to be politically assured.

Let “Now or never!” be our watchword.
Woe to our descendants, woe to the memory
of our Jewish contemporaries, if we let this ,
moment pass by! ;

We may sum up the contents of this .

pamphlet in the following sentences:

The Jews are not a living nation; they
are everywhere aliens; therefore they are
despised.

The civil and political emancipation of
the Jews is not sufficient to raise them in
the estimation of the peoples.

The proper, the only remedy, would be

So ERE ae ee eee

16 AUTO-EMANCIPATION

the ereation of a Jewish nationality, of athan any other for the plan unfolded.

people living upon its own soil, the auto-
emancipation of the Jews; their emancipa-
‘tion as a nation among nations by the ae-
quisition of a home of their own.

We should not persuade ourselves that
humanity and enlightenment will ever be
radical remedies for the malady of our peo-
ple.

The lack of national self-respect and
self-confidence, of political initiative and of
unity, are the enemies of our national re-
naissance.

In order that we may not be constrained
to wander from one exile to another we
must have an extensive, productive place of
refuge, a rendezvous which is our own.

The present moment is more favorable

The international Jewish question must
receive a national solution. Of course, our
national regeneration can only proceed
slowly. We must take the first step. Our
descendants must follow us in measured
and not over-hasty time.

A way must be opened for the national
regeneration of the Jews by a congress of
Jewish notables:

No sacrifice would be too great in order
to reach the goal which will assure our
people’s future, everywhere endangered.

The financial accomplishment of the un-
dertaking can in the present state of the
case encounter no insuperable difficulties.

Help yourselves, and God will help you!